


Fallen Kingdom

by AstralPrince



Category: The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)
Genre: Aaravos Being a Little Shit (The Dragon Prince), Canon-Typical Racism, Canonical Character Death, Claudia Redemption (The Dragon Prince), Crackpot theory time, Dark Magic, Elarion was both a city and a person, Gen, Long Lost/Secret Relatives, Magic, Multi, Off-screen Relationship(s), Past Character Death, Post-Book: Through the Moon (The Dragon Prince), Rayllum reunion in later chapters, Speculation, This is probably VERY AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-04
Updated: 2021-01-03
Packaged: 2021-03-14 04:28:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28539612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AstralPrince/pseuds/AstralPrince
Summary: It was common knowledge that there were five human kingdoms. A pentarchy, as it was called, was after all five monarchies. However, each kingdom reflected one of the six primal sources, just like their elven counterparts. Nobody questioned this for a thousand years, until a curious human mage decided to poke some ruins with his glowing cube.
Relationships: Aaravos & Callum (The Dragon Prince), Aaravos & Viren (The Dragon Prince), Aaravos/Elarion (The Dragon Prince), Allen/Lujanne (The Dragon Prince), Callum & Rayla (The Dragon Prince), Callum/Rayla (The Dragon Prince), Harrow/Sarai (The Dragon Prince), Past Sarai (The Dragon Prince)/Original Male Character(s)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 26





	Fallen Kingdom

**Author's Note:**

> Hi there! This idea just wouldn't leave me alone, and with season 4 still being so far away, I need more content. I really want my favorite kids to reunite now, and not later. + this gives me a awesome opportunity to drag you into my dark corner full of weird theories!  
> Before we start here, let me have this moment. Yea? So, if you have not read Through the moon and you don't want to be spoiled then turn away. I'll try my best to avoid spoilers, but the ending is where this will start so...  
> I'm also adding some characters again because speculating about Callum's lineage is too much fun. I will not make these OCs take the spotlight however. This story is mainly Callum centric, unless it's a Rayla chapter.

> _Elarion, your darkened crown,_  
>  _It turned to ash and cinders._
> 
> _However, your roots have spread deep down,_  
>  _You survived the sun king's fire._
> 
> _Elarion, your heir comes home,_  
>  _He is rekindling your heartstone embers._

Before his journey to Xadia, Callum did not understand what all of this meant. His mother's lullaby, a song she supposedly learned from his father, was strange. He had heard it many times, but she stopped singing it after Ezran was born for some reason. It twisted his heart into a tight knot of uneasiness and melancholy, almost as if it was an echo of the long forgotten past. It shook him to the core of his soul each time he heard it. He was no stranger to loss nor grief, and yet he still held hope in his heart. Just like his mother's, or rather his father's song, he burnt down to ashes and cinders, leaving only good roots in place to tether himself to life and regrow, stronger, better.

It was his fifteenth birthday. Fifteen years ago, he saw the light of the world for the first time. His mother told him that he was born underneath the light of the morning star, which made him a lucky person according to myths and legends. Callum did not feel lucky at all. In fact his emotions were doing flip flops on the cracked lump of disappointment that was his heart. 

Rayla had left him. She had lied to him. It hurt more than he could imagine, even though a tiny part of him had seen this coming. 

When Callum woke up the morning of his fifteenth birthday he knew something had happened. The feeling of doom followed him like an angry storm cloud and it made him want to just forget about standing up at all. He had developed a sort of extra sense for wrongness when his mother died so long ago, and this special sense was now screaming at him much louder than the hurricane of his coma dream that something was seriously wrong. Wrong wrong wrong! 

Before he knew it he was up and running to Rayla's bed to wake her up, but he found nothing underneath the covers. Her bed was neatly made, as if she had not even slept there at all during the night. Not even a single tear could run across his cheek before the young human mage raced out of the guest room, out of the nexus building and into the nearby forest of the cursed caldera. He kept running until his legs hurt, kept screaming her name until his throat was raw and his voice was broken. 

Rayla left without him. She left him behind. 

Callum should be angry. It was honestly very much his right to be mad, to feel betrayed by her white lie. He suspected that she wanted to protect him by doing this, it sounded so much like her, and yet he could not feel anger. All he was feeling was sadness and worry. Callum was so worried. She was out there alone, and no matter how amazing and heroic she was, Rayla was still mortal. She could get hurt, lost or even die, and Callum was powerless to help her because the assassin had vanished without a trace. Once that realization had sunken in the tears started to roll down like wild raindrops. 

His brother Ezran and his never absent companion glow toad Bait were already waiting for him. By the looks of it, the two had found the empty beds and connected the dots while he was out in the forest. Bait croaked, turning a sad shade of grey as he looked at Callum, who was still in his now ruined night clothes. Ezran didn't need to speak. He just walked up to his older brother and gave him one of the warmest hugs that the world has ever seen. Even if he was smaller, he had enough love in him to warm up Callum's broken cold heart. 

The betrayal stung. It was a deep cut right into a piece of his heart that he couldn't reach. A wound he could bandage. A sore he could massage, but this? This was a wound that he could not heal with his hands. He was no stranger to loss, but unlike his parents, Rayla was not gone forever. It wasn't a clean cut and the little bit of hope he felt burned brighter than dragonfire. 

"Callum..." 

He looked up to see a sad Lujanne, right beside a shaking Allen. He was almost taking this worse than Callum himself, but only almost. 

"I'm so sorry. When I told you about the white lies I meant small things. Things like who ate the last moonberry surprise, or who left the door open to let the adoraburrs in. This, I..."

Callum cut her off, "I don't blame you." Then he forced a small smile to show that he was really not mad at the moon mage. 

In return, Lujanne sighed off the weight of her worries. It looked like a mountain fell off her shoulders. Allen seemed to relax as well. His brown eyes were warm and full of open empathy for the young sky mage. 

"Lujanne?" Callum asked the older moonshadow, "will she come back?" 

Instead of a verbal reply, the guardian of the moon nexus wrapped her arms around the human prince and gave him an encouraging squeeze. He spoke enough moonshadow elf to know that this meant a maybe, but a positive maybe. Ezran joined in as well to give the hug more warmth, and lastly Allen threw himself around the group like a protective blanket. Empowered, loved and safe now, Callum could finally calm down and just breathe. 

Of course Callum didn't wish to celebrate at all. No amount of grub cake, _real_ cake or illusion magic could cheer him up. He appreciated that his brother, Allen and Lujanne tried so hard, but Callum was too hurt to even attempt to fake a smile. All he wanted to do was to fly straight after his girlfriend, until the anger kicked in and made him huff and puff furiously. She dared to leave him behind, after everything they went through, she left without saying goodbye to him. He disappeared at around noon and did not make a peep for a while. They gave him much needed space.

Lujanne knocked on the heavy doors of the moon temple where Callum was meditating to get his still raging emotions under control. Next to the hotheaded sunfire, sky mages were a hurricane if they were feeling anything. Now that Callum had the sky arcanum he was the same. He was a whirlwind of passionate freedom, as well as a terrible thunderstorm of anger, if provoked enough. Thankfully Callum was a rather peaceful person by default. 

"Sorry... Am I in the way? Should I move?" He mumbled out loud enough for Lujanne to understand, but too muffled to sound happy. 

"It's fine. No, that is not why I'm here. Callum... you can't let this chain you down. I know you wish to learn magic, and since you connected to the sky I have been wondering if you could do it again. This time, with the moon."

Callum nodded interested in her idea, but not quite in the mood to get excited about it. 

"Go to the ruins of Elarion and meditate there to get a feeling for death, then come back and be reborn here near the nexus. Explaining the circle of life is much too... boring. I feel like you would do better if you experienced this first hand." 

"I... don't know." 

"If you learn more magic, Rayla won't be able to leave you behind again. She knows better than to decline the help of a fully realized moon mage, much less a mage with two arcana."

Callum's eyes became wide as the thought bounced between two of his last coherent brain cells. The rest of the boy was softly melting with exhaustion. He liked the idea, and in his currently heartbroken state it sounded too sweet to be real. All he has to do was try. He would meditate near the ruins of Elarion and forge a connection with the moon, and then he could prove to Rayla that he wasn't helpless. He was no burden. He was her partner in more ways than the romantic one. Then his thoughts made a full stop.

"Did you say Elarion?" He asked suddenly.

"Ah yes. It was once a great human city, but dark magic ate it from the inside. It fell when the mages living there cast unspeakably dark spells." 

"No. No it didn't." Callum furrowed his brows. "It was burned to the ground. One dark mage didn't want to give up his dark magic, and in return a dragon burned the whole city to the ground." 

"Oh please, the dragons would never do anything this unjust."

Lujanne laughed and waved her hands dismissively. However, when she saw the pure raw horror in Callum's eyes she stopped. Awkward silence wrapped around them both for a far too long moment. Then Callum broke it again, and he was speaking with the clarity and conviction of a man who knew what he was talking about. He was perfectly sure that his mother told him the truth about the city, even if it had been through his father's song.

"I'll go. I will connect to the moon arcanum, than cast _Historia Viventem_ \- and I will find out what really happened to the city." 

Before she could reply Callum ran off to grab his bag, and he was most likely be telling his brother about his plans in a few minutes, and then fly into the dusky early night sky. Lujanne sighed. It was moments like this one where her age gnawed on the marrow in her bones. Ever faithfully hers, Allen put a arm around her shoulders and nudged the moon guardian into an embrace.

"He'll be fine." 

"It's not Callum I worry about." She admitted as she looked at the spot where said human had previously stood, "it's Rayla. The girl doesn't know what is waiting for her. I am no startouch, but I don't need to peek into the future to know the dark mage is too powerful for her alone." 

Allen huffed, making him appear like a giant teddy bear. 

"Why didn't you warn him, Janey-Lu?" 

"Because he's not ready for that either. Losing one is painful. Losing both... I don't want to think about it. These two are the ones to change the world. I pray to our pale lady moon above that they get a happy end." 

As predicted, the sound of large feathered wings scared away a murder of crows nearby. Callum had indeed taken off into the sunset and towards a new adventure. She was about to go down to the main hall to comfort Ezran when she heard a glow toad croak in the sky. 


End file.
